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Monday, March 26, 2012

Sticks and Stones

Over the last few years I have been connecting and discovering so many interesting bloggers/writers on the Internet. There are so many talented people whose voice jumps off the page and captivate me on the first post and I haven't been able to stop reading since. In recent months I have read some incredibly powerful and moving posts that tackle difficult topics such as mental illness, body image acceptance, grief, abortion, domestic violence and sexual orientation. These posts were so heartfelt and incredibly brave for each person to write much less hit the publish button. This is why I was so stunned to read the sheer hate in some (not all and definitely not most) of the comments of these posts. Conflicting views and not agreeing with the writer is something that should foster discussions, view points and intelligent arguments from all sides. But the comments of wishing people ill, death and just plain hate made me feel sick. How is it acceptable to wish such dreadful thing for people? There is freedom of speech and there is hateful, useless words that people use to attempt to harm others. They say that words will never hurt you, but they do. I am not trying to suggest that we censor things that we don't agree with, but rather encourage people to use their words without hate to help us all understand each others point of view. While I may not agree with everything you say I respect it when it is presented without hate. I can only hope that others will do the same.